The Latest Insights from Leading NOW

The 2016 Deloitte Millennial Study is out - and Leading Women's research is in and neither is great news for companies without a leadership development program for their Millennial women: Deloitte research says: “This year’s survey shows that women are equally likely as men to rate 'opportunities for career progression and leadership roles' as a major factor for staying at or leaving a job.” “Millennials want to work for organizations that have a purpose beyond profit, and they want those organizations to provide opportunities to develop leadership skills. These may be the two most important factors in creating job satisfaction and long-term loyalty, especially among Millennial women.” “This year’s survey shows women (67 percent) are slightly more likely than men (64 percent) to leave their employers within the next five years. One reason could be that 48 percent of female respondents say they are 'being overlooked for potential leadership positions.'”

Recently I read an article about Fortune Magazine’s Pattie Sellers moderating a discussion with execs from Facebook, Coca-Cola and FCB Worldwide on how their companies were attacking the problem of unconscious bias. When referring to unconscious bias, Maxine Williams, global director of diversity at Facebook spoke about “a problem that, as increasing numbers of companies are realizing, prevents them from improving their workforce diversity and typically interferes with the productivity of their employees.” When Seller asked the audience of 200 executives whether they had unconscious bias training programs within their company, only a dozen raised their hands. When asked how many would like to have a program, practically the entire room raised their hands. Huh. If unconscious bias is as big a problem as it seems, why don’t more companies have a plan to deal with it?

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